Agent K Quotes

We do have CIA agent Lily Carson in the room. You overseas folks know Lily very well." Wesley Bromwell joked. "Oxford University hasn't been the same since Lily left England with her masters degree.

They want to be the agents, not the victims, of history. They identify with God's power and believe they are godlike. That is their basic madness. They are overcome by some archtype; their egos have expanded psychotically so that they cannot tell where they begin and the godhead leaves off. It is not hubris, not pride; it is inflation of the ego to its ultimate — confusion between him who worships and that which is worshipped. Man has not eaten God; God has eaten man.

But— Why didn’t you say?” “Secret agent. Secret.

Vengeance is one of life's great motivators.

Past persons of Scottishness in contact with mastermind of supernatural persuasion in London, aka Agent Doom.’ Floote moved on to the third bit of paper. “ ‘Lady K says Agent Doom assisted depraved Plan of Action. May have all been his idea.’ Moving on to the last one, he read out, "Summer permits Scots to expose more knee than lady of refinement should have to withstand. Hairmuffs much admired. Yours etc., Puff Bonnet.

We travelled from Oberau with a tourist agent, and he told us all his troubles.  It seems that a tourist agent is an ordinary human man, and has feelings just like we have.  This had never occurred to me before.  I told him so.

Imagine a young Isaac Newton time-travelling from 1670s England to teach Harvard undergrads in 2017. After the time-jump, Newton still has an obsessive, paranoid personality, with Asperger’s syndrome, a bad stutter, unstable moods, and episodes of psychotic mania and depression. But now he’s subject to Harvard’s speech codes that prohibit any “disrespect for the dignity of others”; any violations will get him in trouble with Harvard’s Inquisition (the ‘Office for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion’). Newton also wants to publish Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, to explain the laws of motion governing the universe. But his literary agent explains that he can’t get a decent book deal until Newton builds his ‘author platform’ to include at least 20k Twitter followers – without provoking any backlash for airing his eccentric views on ancient Greek alchemy, Biblical cryptography, fiat currency, Jewish mysticism, or how to predict the exact date of the Apocalypse. Newton wouldn’t last long as a ‘public intellectual’ in modern American culture. Sooner or later, he would say ‘offensive’ things that get reported to Harvard and that get picked up by mainstream media as moral-outrage clickbait. His eccentric, ornery awkwardness would lead to swift expulsion from academia, social media, and publishing. Result? On the upside, he’d drive some traffic through Huffpost, Buzzfeed, and Jezebel, and people would have a fresh controversy to virtue-signal about on Facebook. On the downside, we wouldn’t have Newton’s Laws of Motion.

A psychotic world we live in. The madmen are in power. How long have we known this? Faced this?-And-how many of us do know it? Not Lotze. Perhaps if you know you are insane then you are not insane. Or you are becoming sane, finally. Waking up. I suppose only a few are aware of all this. Isolated persons here and there. But the broad masses...what do they think? All these hundreds of thousands in this city, here. Do they imagine that they live in a sane world? Or do they guess, glimpse the truth...? But, he thought, what does it mean, insane? A legal definition. What do I mean? I feel it, see it, but what is it? He thought, it is something they do, something they are. It is their unconsciousness. Their lack of knowledge about others. Their not being aware of what they do to others, the destruction they have caused and are causing. No, he thought. That isn't it. I don't know; I sense it, inuit it. But-they are purposely cruel...is that it? No. God, he thought, I can't find it, make it clear. Do they ignore parts of reality? Yes. But it is more. It is their plans. Yes, their plans. The conquering of the planets. Something frenzied and demented, as was their conquering of Africa, and before that, Europe and Asia. Their view; it is cosmic. Not of man here, a child there, but an abstraction: race, land. Volk. Land. Blut. Ehre. Not of honorable men but of Ehre itself, honor; the abstract is real, the actual is invisible to them. Die Gute, but not good men, this good man. It is their sense of space and time. They see through the here, the now, into the vast black deep beyond, the unchanging. And that is fatal to life. Because eventually there will be no life; there was once only the dust particles in space, the hot hydrogen gases, nothing more, and it will come again. This is an interval, ein Augenblick. The cosmic process is hurrying on, crushing life back into the granite and methane; the wheel turns for all life. It is all temporary. And they-these madmen-respond to the granite, the dust, the longing of the inanimate; they want to aid Natur. And, he thought, I know why. They want to be the agents, not the victims, of history. They identify with God's power and believe they are godlike. That is their basic madness. They are overcome by some archetype; their egos have expanded psychotically so that they cannot tell where they begin and the godhead leaves off. it is not hubris, not pride; it is inflation of the ego to its ultimate-confusion between him who worships and that which is worshiped. Man has not eaten God; God has eaten man. What they do not comprehend is man's helplessness. I am weak, small, of no consequence to the universe. It does not notice me; I live on unseen. But why is that bad? Isn't it better that way? Whom the gods notice they destroy. Be small...and you will escape the jealousy of the great.

It seemed to k. as if all contact with him had been cut and he was more of a free agent than ever. He could wait here, in a place usually forbidden to him, as long as he liked, and he also felt as if he gad won that freedom with more effort than most people could manage to make, and no one could touch him or drive him away, why, they hardly had a right even to adress him. But at the same time - and this feeling was at least as strong - he felt as if there were nothing more meaningless and more desperate than this freedom, this waiting, this invulnerability.

agent inside S.I.S. who had picked up Zalachenko’s trail. Right now we’re examining a large number of old personnel files.” “But if the K.G.B. had

When you stop eating meat, you feel light from inside. When you abstain from inflicting cruelty on animals, you will no longer be an agent of pain.

This monograph by Special Agent Ken Lanning (1992) is merely a guide for those who may investigate this phenomenon, as the title indicates, and not a study. The author is a well known skeptic regarding cult and ritual abuse allegations and has consulted on a number of cases but to our knowledge has not personally investigated the majority of these cases, some of which have produced convictions. p179 [refers to Lanning, K. V. (1992) Investigator's guide to allegations of "ritual" child abuse. Quantico, VA: National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime.]

The precise metaphysical procedures by which a book goes about writing another book need not concern us here. Suffice to say that our human scribes remain entirely ignorant of their possession by bibliographic forces; the agent in question never doubts that his authorship is authentic.

As for the danger of alienating people with good intentions — well, one of the things that I learned from RaceFail (and also from general experience) was that people with good intentions are the ones to fear most. The overt racists are easy to deal with. You can spot them coming a mile away. But the well-intentioned people are scarier. They might not intend harm, but in most cases they haven’t thought about all the racist (and other “-ist”) messages they’ve absorbed from society. They haven’t done the basic groundwork necessary to purge themselves of that passively-absorbed “-ism”. So they say the most incredibly hurtful, self-absorbed, and utterly useless things, then compound the problem by getting upset when they’re called on it. I liken these people to sleeper agents — they seem OK at first, but then they suddenly “activate” and stab you in the back, and then they come out of their fugue and freak because there’s blood on their hands and they don’t know how it got there and they refuse to accept that they’re the ones who put it there, OMG, OMG. Meanwhile, you’re on the floor bleeding out, unnoticed because of their histrionics. The rage of RaceFail made many of these well-intentioned sleeper agents wake up. So while yes, I think the anger risked alienating some of them, I’m fine with that. They were always dangerous; I haven’t lost anything by their alienation. The ones who wake up are a gain (or they will be, once they shift from “not causing harm” anymore to “actually trying to help”).

So is that what I am to you? Just another hammer?" "Of course," said Sir Alec. "And so am I. So is everyone with a gift that can be exploited.

Not tingling as much as a rapid-burning desire and longing. I want him to f**k me. Right here. Right now.

But that is what Catalysts did. They made the difficult choices, the ones no one else had the courage, or insight, to make. They were, after all, the agents of change.

there was once only the dust particles in space, the hot hydrogen gases, nothing more, and it will come again. This is an interval, ein Augenblick. The cosmic process is hurrying on, crushing life back into the granite and methane; the wheel turns for all life. It is all temporary. And they—these madmen—respond to the granite, the dust, the longing of the inanimate; they want to aid Natur. And, he thought, I know why. They want to be the agents, not the victims, of history. They identify with God’s power and believe they are godlike. That is their basic madness.

We can't undo what's happened. The dead are buried and we can't unbury them. All we can do is live the rest of our lives in a way that won't shame their memories. And make sure nothing like this ever happens again.

They are what we once dreamed of as gods, mythical agents of destiny, as inescapable as Death, that poor old peasant laborer, bent over his scythe, no longer is. Poor Death, no match for the mighty altered-carbon technologies of data storage and retrieval arrayed against him. Once we lived in terror of his arrival. Now we flirt outrageously with his somber dignity, and beings like these won’t even let him in the tradesman’s entrance.

They want to be the agents, not the victims, of history. They identify with God’s power and believe they are godlike. That is their basic madness. They are overcome by some archetype; their egos have expanded psychotically so that they cannot tell where they begin and the godhead leaves off. It is not hubris, not pride; it is inflation of the ego to its ultimate – confusion between him who worships and that which is worshipped. Man has not eaten God; God has eaten man.

666 HOW TO JOIN ILLUMINATI SECRET SOCIETY FOR MONEY. Get Rich Quick Join 666 now. JOIN THE BROTHERHOOD Money, Power, Fame and Love. For those who are interested in making money, every good thing comes with money, comes with extra effort. All u need do is a “Spiritual work” and every wicked power delaying your progress wants clear and good things will come to you like, money, favour from people, open doors, business breakthrough, good job. Note: It’s not a child’s play, it’s for those who are desperate and ready to make a change in their life. We are seeki¬ng that speci¬al wisdo¬m and knowl¬edge that would set us free from the bonda¬ge to dull and drear¬y every¬day life, while stren¬gthen¬ing us in body, mind and spiri¬t, and bring-ing us the mater¬ial rewar¬ds of wealt¬h, love, and succe¬ss. The Karis¬hika Broth¬erhoo¬d is a true broth¬erhoo¬d of secre¬t knowl¬edge and power¬. Me¬mber s¬hip into our frate¬rnity is free and norma¬lly throu¬gh a thoro¬ugh scree¬ning. We are here to liber¬ate those who need wealt¬h, riche¬s, power¬, prosp¬erity¬, prote¬ction and succe¬ss in all ramif¬icati¬on. Broth¬erhoo¬d offer¬s all initi¬ate membe¬rs growt¬h, wealt¬h, fame, power¬, prosp¬erity and succe¬ss in all areas of heart desir¬es. We don’t deman¬d human sacri¬fice, the use of any human parts or early perso¬nal death as a preco¬nditi¬on for you to becom¬e our membe¬r. W¬ant to join occul¬t in Switzerland how can I join secre¬t socie¬ty or cult to make money¬ how can join occul¬t for riche¬s I want to be rich but I don’t know how etc. how do I do money ritua¬l ho¬w do I join good occul¬t that will not affec¬t me and my famil¬y forev¬er w¬e are now here for you. K¬indly conta¬ct us on +41767918253 or email: info786@pm.me Contact Person Agent Adam Address: Kronenstrasse 25 9230 Flawil Switzerland

It's like asking, what's an impostor look like?" Arctor said. "I talked one time to a big hash dealer who'd been busted with ten pounds of hash in his possession. I asked him what the nark who busted him looked like. You know, the -- what do they call them? -- buying agent that came out and posed as a friend of a friend and got him to sell him some hash." "Looked," Barris said, winding string, "just like us." "More so," Arctor said. "The hash-dealer dude -- he'd already been sentenced and was going in the following day -- he told me, 'They have longer hair than we do.' So I guess the moral of that is, Stay away from guys looking the same as us.

He awoke—and wanted Mars. The valleys, he thought. What would it be like to trudge among them? Great and greater yet: the dream grew as he became fully conscious, the dream and the yearning. He could almost feel the enveloping presence of the other world, which only Government agents and high officials had seen. A clerk like himself? Not likely. “Are

It is only through the breakdown of his ordinary reality that he can be in-formed by the suprasensual reality of the divine letter: the Logos. Here, as in the famous opening of the Gospel of John—“In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God”—language becomes an “active agent” that is actually prior to material reality.

Since the early 1990s, a shadow government has taken root along K Street, the Washington corridor that is home to block after stately block of law firms and lobbying offices. Over the years, this army of influence peddlers has gone well beyond the hunt for votes on Capitol Hill. Smart lobbyists know that it is not just the final vote on a bill that counts, but every step along the way. Business enjoys huge political advantages by having its lobbying agents meet day in and day out with key legislators and their staffs, either to kill bills or provisions in them that business considers hostile or to insert arcane subparagraphs that its lobbyists have drafted and tailored to specific corporate interests.

At the risk of oversimplification, the unifying theme of the Hebrew scripture is one of forging a national identity connected to God through a covenant. God remains an active, though an increasingly distant, agent in this creation of Jewish identity, acting chiefly through his prophets, cajoling Israel into becoming a nation, into being a people of God.

The universe always brings you where you need to be, at the time you need to be there.

He had an egglike head, froglike jaws, and a grey hairy fringe of aureole round the lower part of his face; the whole combined with a reddish, acquiline nose. He wore a shabby black frock-coat, a sort of semi-clerical tie worn at a very unclerical angle, and looking, generally speaking, about as unlike a house-agent as anything could look, short of something like a sandwich-man or a Scotch Highlander.

They want to be the agents, not the victims, of history. They identify with God’s power and believe they are godlike. That is their basic madness. They are overcome by some archetype; their egos have expanded psychotically so that they cannot tell where they begin and the godhead leaves off. It is not hubris, not pride; it is inflation of the ego to its ultimate—confusion between him who worships and that which is worshiped. Man has not eaten God; God has eaten man.

e, pensou, eu sei por quê. querem ser os agentes da história, não as vítimas. identificam-se com o poder de Deus e acreditam ser divinos. é essa sua loucura básica. foram dominados por algum arquétipo; seus egos expandiram-se psicoticamente ao ponto de não saber onde eles começam e onde para a essência divina. não é hubris, não é orgulho; é uma hipertrofia do ego levadas às últimas consequências - confusão entre quem venera e aquilo que é venerado. o homem não devorou Deus; Deus devorou o homem.

Aruna's husband Asaf Ali was seemingly a freedom fighter but unbeknownst to his comrades, he was in fact a British agent inside the Congress Working Committee, which was collectively imprisoned on the first day the agitation started. When the British left, they forgot a few files by mistake, and one of them revealed Ali's espionage. Ali, already sent to Washington as India's first ambassador there, was recalled and sidelines as Governor of Orissa, though M.K. Gandhi intervened to spare him an overt fall from grace.

Rasputin, returning to his village on June 27, had been followed there without his knowledge by Khina Gusseva, Iliodor’s agent. Gusseva caught the starets alone in a village street. She accosted him and, when he turned, drove Iliodor’s knife deep into his stomach. “I have killed the Antichrist,” she screamed hysterically and then attempted unsuccessfully to stab herself. Rasputin was gravely hurt; the slash in his stomach had exposed his entrails. He was taken to a hospital in Tyumen, where a specialist sent by his friends in St. Petersburg performed an operation.

When we are children our parents tell us precisely what we must and must not do, for our understanding is circumscribed and our knowledge of the world incomplete. But when we are grown they nod and say, 'We have taught you well. Go know into the world and remember what you learned at our table.

Thank you Neil, and to the givers of this beautiful reward, my thanks from the heart. My family, my agent, editors, know that my being here is their doing as well as mine, and that the beautiful reward is theirs as much as mine. And I rejoice at accepting it for, and sharing it with, all the writers who were excluded from literature for so long, my fellow authors of fantasy and science fiction—writers of the imagination, who for the last 50 years watched the beautiful rewards go to the so-called realists. I think hard times are coming when we will be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now and can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies to other ways of being, and even imagine some real grounds for hope. We will need writers who can remember freedom. Poets, visionaries—the realists of a larger reality. Right now, I think we need writers who know the difference between the production of a market commodity and the practice of an art. Developing written material to suit sales strategies in order to maximize corporate profit and advertising revenue is not quite the same thing as responsible book publishing or authorship. (Thank you, brave applauders.) Yet I see sales departments given control over editorial; I see my own publishers in a silly panic of ignorance and greed, charging public libraries for an ebook six or seven times more than they charge customers. We just saw a profiteer try to punish a publisher for disobedience and writers threatened by corporate fatwa, and I see a lot of us, the producers who write the books, and make the books, accepting this. Letting commodity profiteers sell us like deodorant, and tell us what to publish and what to write. (Well, I love you too, darling.) Books, you know, they’re not just commodities. The profit motive often is in conflict with the aims of art. We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art—the art of words. I have had a long career and a good one. In good company. Now here, at the end of it, I really don’t want to watch American literature get sold down the river. We who live by writing and publishing want—and should demand—our fair share of the proceeds. But the name of our beautiful reward is not profit. Its name is freedom. Thank you.

And it is only in its early stage. All those who believe they will remain untouched by its wrath are delusional. If Ehsan Jafri, a former member of parliament with a line to the deputy prime minister’s office, could be dragged out of his home and gashed and burned alive, what makes anyone think he or she will remain unharmed? If Aamir Khan, one of India’s biggest film stars, can be unpersoned; if Gauri Lankesh, one of its boldest journalists, can be shot dead; if Ramachandra Guha, one of its greatest historians, can be stopped from lecturing; if Naseeruddin Shah, among its finest actors, can be branded a traitor; if Manmohan Singh, the former prime minister, can be labelled an agent of Pakistan by his successor; if B.H. Loya, a perfectly healthy judge, can abruptly drop dead; if a young woman can be stalked by the police machinery of the state because Modi has displayed an interest in her—what makes the rest of us think we will remain untouched and unharmed? Unless the republic is reclaimed, the time will come when all of us will be one incorrect meal, one interfaith romance, one unfortunate misstep away from being extinguished. The mobs that slaughtered ‘bad’ Muslims will eventually come for Hindus who are not ‘good’.

One sultan, Ibrahim the Mad, encased his beard in a network of diamonds and passed his days tossing gold coins to the fish in the Bosphorus. He wanted to see and feel nothing but fur, and levied a special tax for the import of sables from Russia so that he might cover the walls of his apartments with these precious furs. Deciding that the bigger a woman was, the more enjoyable she would be, he had his agents search the empire for the fattest woman they could find. They brought him an enormous Armenian woman, who so fascinated the Sultan that he heaped riches and honors upon her and finally made her Governor General of Damascus. 41

It is—their unconsciousness. Their lack of knowledge about others. Their not being aware of what they do to others, the destruction they have caused and are causing. [...] Do they ignore parts of reality? Yes. But it is more. It is their plans. Yes, their plans. The conquering of the planets. Something frenzied and demented, as was their conquering of Africa, and before that, Europe and Asia. Their view; it is cosmic. Not of a man here, a child there, but an abstraction: race, land. Volk. Land. Blut. Ehre. Not of honorable men but of Ehre itself, honor; the abstract is real, the actual is invisible to them. Die Güte, but not good men, this good man. It is their sense of space and time. They see through the here, the now, into the vast black deep beyond, the unchanging. And that is fatal to life. Because eventually there will be no life; there was once only the dust particles in space, the hot hydrogen gases, nothing more, and it will come again. This is an interval, ein Augenblick. The cosmic process is hurrying on, crushing life back into the granite and methane; the wheel turns for all life. It is all temporary. And they—these madmen—respond to the granite, the dust, the longing of the inanimate; they want to aid Natur. […] They want to be the agents, not the victims, of history.

When the moment of departure arrived, Catherine and Peter accompanied Johanna on the short first stage of her journey, from Tsarskoe Selo to nearby Krasnoe Selo. The next morning, Johanna left before dawn without saying goodbye; Catherine assumed that it was “not to make me any sadder.” Waking up and finding her mother’s room empty, she was distraught. Her mother had vanished—from Russia and from her life. Since Catherine’s birth, Johanna had always been present, to guide, prompt, correct, and scold. She might have failed as a diplomatic agent; she certainly had not become a brilliant figure on the European stage; but she had not been unsuccessful as a mother. Her daughter, born a minor German princess, was now an imperial grand duchess on a path to becoming an empress.

If they want you, a youngish Quell had once written of the Harlan’s World ruling elite, sooner or later they’ll scoop you up off the globe, like specks of interesting dust off a Martian artifact. Cross the gulf between the stars, and they can come after you. Go into centuries of storage, and they’ll be there waiting for you, clone new, when you resleeve. They are what we once dreamed of as gods, mythical agents of destiny, as inescapable as Death, that poor old peasant laborer, bent over his scythe, no longer is. Poor Death, no match for the mighty altered-carbon technologies of data storage and retrieval arrayed against him. Once we lived in terror of his arrival. Now we flirt outrageously with his somber dignity, and beings like these won’t even let him in the tradesman’s entrance.

But under the beards--and this was K.'s real discovery­ --badges of various sizes and colors gleamed on their coat­ collars. They all wore those badges as far he could see. They were all colleagues, these ostensible parties of the right and left, and as he turned round suddently he saw the same badges on the coat collar of the Examining Magistrate, who was sitting quietly watching the scene with his hands on his knees. "So!" cried K. flinging his arms in the air, his sudden enlightenment had to break out, "every man jack of you is an official, I see, you are yourselves the corrupt agents of whom I have been speaking, you've all come rushing here to listen and nose out what you can about me, making a pretense of party divisions, and half of you applauded merely to lead me on, you wanted some practice in fooling an innocent man.

JOIN ILLUMINATI ORDER” CALL +41 76 791 8253 FOR RICH, WEALTH, FAME, LOVE & LUCK. Welcome to the great temple of Illuminati worldwide. Are you a Pastor, Politician, Business man or woman, Musician or an Artist, do you want to be famous or you want to become rich or powerful you can achieve your dreams by being a member of the Illuminati with this all your dreams and heart desire can be fully accomplish People say that the Illuminati are exceptionally wealthy. Is that true? It's true that all twelve members of the Ruling Council are wealthy, but money, for us, simply funds our mission, nothing else. We are not worshippers of Mammon, as our accusers would have you believe. You were born free and die free but will you live free? As long as habit and routine dictate the pattern of living, new dimensions of the soul will not emerge. "Wealth" of the Illuminati is in the form of priceless treasures, not "liquid" money. Some members of the Illuminati have acquired considerable wealth; if you want to join Illuminati contact the priest. To join everyone can join but are you going to keep the secret? BRIEFLY this is a spiritual worshiping whereby it helps you to be successfully in whatever you're doing in life. All men and women are welcome to join this Temple of Only Success, Respect and Super-Rich Model's DJ and rappers welcome Politicians come and wetness Bring your lovers name only and see the changes Business men and women Students come and clean your future GET OUT OF POVERTY Get off the poverty road and onto the path of prosperity now. If money has been tight and things haven't been going very well financially, Our Illuminati society will empower you to change your life and live your life to the fullest. K¬indly conta¬ct us on +41767918253 or email: info786@pm.me Contact Person Agent Adam Address: Kronenstrasse 25 9230 Flawil Switzerland

Government in and of itself is the foremost agent for destroying order and imposing chaos." "To accept the legitimacy of the state is to embrace the necessity for war." "Political theory would be fine in a perfect world, but in an uncertain one, it is a dangerous gamble.

A reordering of creation has already broken into creation in the person of Jesus Christ, and we are gathering as a people in order to practice for the arrival of the kingdom in its fullness—and thus in order to be trained to be a kingdom-kind-of-people in the meantime, as witnesses to that kingdom, in and through our work as cultural agents.

Exploitation: early entrants make use of the wealth of opportunity in their environment to multiply. Most fail, not least because they are poorly-connected individuals facing a dangerous world on their own, but some may eventually build a system with potential and connectedness. This is known as the r phase: r has for many years been used as a label for the rate of growth of the population of an ecology (example of phase: young trees).2 2. Conservation: the system persists in its mature form, with the benefit of a complex structure of connections, strong enough now to resist challenges for a long time, but with the weakness that the connections themselves introduce an element of rigidity, slowing down its reactions and reducing its inventiveness. This is the K phase, where the ecology reaches its carrying capacity (example: mature trees).3 In due course, however, the tight connections themselves become a decisive problem, which can only be resolved by . . . The back loop (moving from bottom-right to top-left in the diagram): 3. . . . release: at this point, the cost and complication of maintaining the large scale—providing the resources the system needs, and disposing of its waste—becomes too great. The space and flexibility for local responsiveness had become scarce, the system itself so tightly connected that it locked: a target for predators without and within, against which it found it harder and harder to defend itself. But now the stresses join up, and the system collapses (example: dying trees). This is the omega (Ω) phase, as suggested by Holling and Gunderson, and it is placed by them in its ecological context: The tightly bound accumulation of biomass and nutrients becomes increasingly fragile (overconnected, in systems terms) until it is suddenly released by agents such as forest fires, droughts, insect pests, or intense pulses of grazing.4 4. Reorganisation: the remains of a system after collapse are unpromising material on which to start afresh, and yet they are an opportunity for a different kind of system to enjoy a brief flowering—decomposing the wood of a former forest, recycling the carbon after a fire, restoring the land with forgiving grass, clearing away the assumptions and grandeur of the previous regime. Reorganisation becomes a busy system in its own right (example: rotting trees). This is the alpha (α) phase.5 In this phase, there is a persistent process of disconnecting, with the former subsidiary parts of the system being broken up. But our diagram is drawn on a graph of potential (increasing from bottom to top) and connectedness (increasing from left to right), which allows us to note a curious aspect of this back loop: the defining relationship of the fore loop—where more potential is correlated with more connectedness—is reversed. In the back loop (even) less connectedness goes with more potential. How can this be?

So it is war. After centuries of peace. War, because one child disliked another. Nursed his hurts and watered them, cosseted them until he grew to manhood and they to hatred. War, for no reason than a warped man's greed for wealth and revenge.

Does the hammer demand of the hand that holds it why the chosen nail should be struck?" "This hammer does, yes!

KEY PLAYERS J. Edgar Hoover: Director of the FBI. Tom White: Agent in charge of the Osage murders investigation. William K. Hale: The so-called “King of the Osage Hills”—was later convicted of first-degree murder in the investigation. Ernest Burkhart: Nephew of William Hale. Conspired with his uncle to murder several Osage for their wealth. Byron Burkhart: Nephew of William Hale, and brother to Ernest Burkhart. Mollie Burkhart: Wife of Ernest Burkhart. Was almost a victim of the deadly conspiracy.

Instead of the bottom-up emphasis on worship as our expression of devotion and praise, historic Christian worship is rooted in the conviction that God is the primary actor or agent in the worship encounter. Worship works from the top down, you might say. In worship we don’t just come to show God our devotion and give him our praise; we are called to worship because in this encounter God (re)makes and molds us top-down.

Driving Change is choosing a change for yourself, acting to create it, and clearing the obstacles for others to join you and change themselves.

I want Change A. Somebody must create Change A. I am somebody. I can start today.

Don’t assume you are the first person to want to work on your project.

[Q]uando a crença de que determinado símbolo tem poder viraliza, contaminando mentes em massa, o símbolo de fato passa a exercer um poder bastante real. Mesmo que seu poder tenha uma origem ficcional (no sentido de não corresponder à realidade), uma vez que o símbolo ganha uma carga libidinal intersubjetiva seus efeitos têm eficácia material, às vezes dramática, sobre o corpo social. Segundo a fórmula da "espiral hipersticional": quanto mais se acredita na magia, mais ela funciona, e quanto mais funciona, mais se acredita. Por isso a hiperstição atua também como um "intensificador de coincidências" (ou de "sincronicidades", como diria o escritor de ficção científica Philip K. Dick); na medida em que um processo hipersticional tem efeito catalisador, conecta e dá coerência a eventos díspares e heterogêneos em uma mesma narrativa, que se torna assim cada vez mais eficaz. Retrospectivamente, a vitória desse processo aparece como inevitável, um destino inexorável, como se o universo estivesse conspirando a favor. A inseparabilidade entre realidade e ficção, para o CCRU, não tinha portanto um sentido pós-moderno, de ceticismo com o mundo objetivo ou antirrealismo. Bem ao contrário, o interesse estava na investigação dos "poderes mágicos" do encantamento semiótico, isto é, a realização, em diferenciados graus, de virtualidades já ativas, em outras palavras: a passagem da ficção para a realidade, que pode ser compreendida como um processo de apoderamento da realidade pela ficção. Nessa perspectiva, a teoria não opera como uma representação passiva, mas como um agente ativo de transformação. Ou, em linguagem mágica, "um portal pelo qual entidades podem emergir".

This is true even for something as mundane as insurance sales. A recent study examined knowledge about multiline insurance (life, home, auto, and commercial) in 150 agents. Not surprisingly, the highly successful agents—as determined by their sales volumes—knew more about the various insurance products than the less successful agents.

At court, the new Tsaritsa quickly became an agent of change.

While I'm writing you I might mention the new novel I'm considering writing; it has to do with the phonograph record business, which I was involved with, at the retail end, for over seven years. I guess I'll make it a S-F novel, though, setting it in the future. My memory tapes (so to speak) have few if any gaps in them about my years in the record business, what with the rip-offs and payola. The small profits for the retailer, the huge chains that are wholesalers-retailers who crowd out the little guy. Provisionally, I will call the record company DOGSHIT RECORDS INC. (Or DRI, as they have now EMI, RCA, MCA, etc.) In my head I've blocked out the tory of an android who has an agent who is another android, but neither knows the other is an invader. (There is a sort of mutual surprise ending, but the main thing is to lay forth the inner workings of an industry for our readership, in a novel of the sort I tend to write and they tend to read.) The musical artist's agent is named (are you ready?) Skim Morewithit, and so forth. There are rip-offs of royalties, two sets of books, all the usual stuff you find today and yesterday in the record business. As to locale, I haven't decided. Maybe on Jupiter, because it will be a (ahem) heavy novel.

The Circumcision Decision If you have a baby boy, chances are you’ll be asked whether or not you want to circumcise him in the hospital. Most of us have inherited a vague sense that circumcision is somehow cleaner or healthier. But these are myths. We’ll share a few facts to jumpstart your research. - The significance of the infant’s pain is often overlooked in circumcision. Hospitals use painful Gomco clamps that sever nerve endings, and most docs make the cut without anesthesia. - Many infants go into shock as a result of the pain they experience in circumcision, and the breastfeeding relationship may be compromised as a result. - The circumcised penis is no cleaner than an intact penis, and requires far more care during the healing process. - “...[P]rofessional societies representing Australian, Canadian, and American pediatricians do not recommend routine circumcision of male newborns.” ~American Medical Association What if you plan to circumcise for reasons of Jewish faith? In Jewish circumcisions, - Boys are circumcised eight days after birth, when natural levels of Vitamin K are the highest. - Anesthetic is traditionally given (in the form of a tiny amount of wine and/or numbing agents). - Mohels (traditional circumcisers) don’t use painful skin clamps. Overheard… After reading up on circumcision, I knew I didn’t want to go through with it. The first reason was medical: the AAP doesn’t recommend routine circumcision. My second reason was emotional. It went against my mama bear instinct to protect my baby. Convincing dad was more difficult. He wanted to have his son like him. (I asked him if he and his dad compared their penises; the answer was no.) My husband watched videos of the procedure being done but had to stop them before they were over. He’d thought it was a simple snip of the ‘extra’ skin, but it’s not. The foreskin is actually fused to the head of the penis, like a fingernail to a nail bed. We took our baby home from the hospital the way he was born, and we haven’t regretted it. ~Lani, mom to Bentley Want to learn more? Check out the Circumcision Resource Center online, a helpful resource filled with medical and psychological literature for those questioning the practice.

Sergei, what are you checking for?” I asked. At first I thought it was funny. He moved quickly and efficiently, making a clean sweep of each room with me trailing behind him. “I am checking to make sure we are alone,” he informed me. “You could be spy.” “Sergei, I’m not a spy. There is no one here in my apartment besides you and me. You know where I work.” I tried to assure him, but I didn’t know what else I could do to convince him otherwise.

They introduced themselves as Agent Jones and Agent Brown — their real names, I later learned, though at the time I didn't believe them.

Mangoes have a lot of potassium, vitamin A, and beta-carotene, plus they have some vitamin C, vitamin K, calcium, phosphorus, and magnesium, as well as a smattering of other nutrients. They’re believed to be a rich source of enzymes, making them ideal to use as a tenderizing agent and perfect for marinades. And one mango contains more than 3½ g of fiber. Choosing the Best Mango Picking

Therian Human Intelligence, Recon, Defense Squadron A.K.A the THIRDS, an elite, military-funded agency comprised of an equal number of Human and Therian agents and intended to uphold the law for all its citizens without prejudice. As

I'm an FBI agent.” “No, seriously, what do you do?” “I'm serious. I'm an FBI agent, been with the Bureau for twelve years.” “Is

Prevne was crawling with agents, he went, even if you went to buy a newspaper your identification was checked. "Easier to have it tattooed on, like you," said Kasimir, "Move your foot, Stefan."—"Move your fat rump, then."—" Oh, mine are German numbers, out of date. A few more wars and I'll run out of skin." --- "Shed it, then, like a snake."---No, they go right down to the bone." --- Shed your bones, then," Stefan said, *be a jellyfish. Be an amoeba. When they pin me down, I bud off. Two little spineless Stefans where they thought they had one MR 64100282A. Four of them, eight, sixteen thirty-two sixty-four a hundred and twenty-eight, I would entirely cover the surface of the globe were it not for my natural enemies.

You need to build a workout plan that can be done anywhere, at any time that efficiently trains your body so you are prepared for any situation. For example, although I rarely go rock climbing, I’ve built my body in such a way that if you sent me climbing today, or whitewater rafting tomorrow, I could do pretty darn well. If I had to run a 5K tomorrow I could do so, even though I haven’t necessarily trained for it. When I traveled around the world with a backpack for a year, I never once set foot in a gym and still managed to get myself in the best shape of my life because I learned to train with antifragility in mind. You need a workout plan that is as antifragile as you hope to become: It can be completed nearly anywhere (no gym required) and helps you build functional strength and power. Want to know the best way to do that? Progressive bodyweight strength training, and varied short-distance running. Combine those two things with a sensible nutrition strategy and you’ll have yourself an antifragile body just like your favorite secret agent.

Boff,” Agent Brent said. “I didn’t know people used that word anymore.” “You young whippersnappers just don’t know a good piece of slang when you hear it,

He was close now. Way too close. Fuck, Harvath said to himself again. Even with subsonic ammo in his suppressed H&K, the 9mm pistol still made a lot of noise. It would sound even louder this close to the house. Somebody was going to hear it. And whoever did was going to come to investigate. Fuck.

L'anthropologue David K. Wright soutient que l'élevage est un agent actif de la désertification du Sahara, qui s'est étendue à mesure que les humains guidaient le bétail vers de nouveaux pâturages. Couplé à la croissance démographique, le pastoralisme y favorise la dévégétalisation et les changements de régime dans les écosystèmes : réduction de la productivité végétale, homogénéisation de la flore, transformation du paysage en une zone dominée par les arbustes et augmentation générale de la végétation xérophile (plantes vivant seulement en milieu aride). Il considère l'introduction des troupeaux comme facteur décisif à l'origine de franchissement de seuils écologiques. C'est l'élevage de pâturage qui aurait catalysé les rétroactions négatives entre les domaines terrestres et atmosphériques, précipitant la désertification du Sahara, autrefois caractérisé par un biome riche en végétation avec des forêts et des broussailles.

A great painting should be more than a sum of technical beauty. At the Barnes, we were taught to look for delicacy, subtlety, power, surprise, grace, firmness, complexity, and drama—but to do so with a scientist’s eye. This was an important point. As an art crime investigator, or an undercover agent posing as a collector, I would have to evaluate and

It's a psychological fantasy of the dream type, more like Kafka I suppose, or like 'The Man Who Was Thursday.' There is no fantasy premise: that is, a fantastic postulate from which things proceed logically; the beginning is natural, factual, normal, as in Hubbard's 'Fear;' the ordinary world, in fact. From there, the book 'degenerates into sheer fantasy,' as my agent puts it. It progresses, I would say, into greater and deeper levels of fantasy; a trip into the dream-regions of symbolism, the unconscious, etc. as one finds in 'Alice in Wonderland,' where the work ends with a final cataclysm of dream-fantasy. I'm saying all this because my point is this: I'm not sure a reader of fantasy would consider this a fantasy. He might consider this merely 'morbid neurotic psychological investigations for sick minds' as del Rey tends to put it. Actually, I think all human minds, sick or well, have regions of dream-symbolism; I see nothing morbid in these symbolistic worlds . . . they have their own logic and structure, their own typical relationships, as Lewis Carroll showed. Not a chaotic or formless world, at all . . . a world that fascinates me. But perhaps not of interest to fantasy readers. Yet, I don't know what else to call this. I call Kafka's work 'fantasies,' for want of a better name. Or Conrad Aiken's ' Silent Snow, Secret Snow.' Or even THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN, and certainly Molnar's 'Liliom,' or the plays of the Capek brothers, or that ghastly Maeterlinck 'Bluebird' thing, and certainly Ibsen's 'Peer Gynt.' To me, the myth and the dream are related; I see myths as symbolistic proto-type experiences, archaic and timeless, occurring in the individual subconscious. The fairy tale, the myth, the dream, are all related. And I see nothing morbid in it . . . the button molder, in 'Peer Gynt' absolutely terrifies me. I sense meaning, there. I can't exactly define it rationally . . . perhaps that's why Ibsen chose to present it that way; perhaps these symbols can't be reduced to exact literal descriptions. Like poetic images, they can't be translated.

whispered. “Trust me,” K-pop said. “Just give it another second or two.” But before she even finished her sentence, one of Christopher’s agents scrunched his nose, leaning his head back

Entretanto, por meio do vídeo discutia coisas do serviço com o seu sócio da Agência, Veme Lindblom. Veme, que não era um homem de ideias, que não era um manipulador de palavras, mas antes um artista no sentido visual do termo, estava numa posição melhor do que Joseph Adams para saber exatamente o que é que o seu superior Emest Eisenbludt, em Moscou, estava a pensar em termos de imagem, em suma, o que preparava no estúdio. — A seguir será São Francisco ― disse Lindblom. ― Estou neste momento na fase de construção. Em que escala? ― inquiriu Adams. ― Sem escala. ― Em tamanho natural? ― disse Adams, incrédulo. ― E Brose concordou? Não será mais um dos loucos devaneios de Eisenbludt? Só uma parte da cidade. Nob Hill e a vista sobre a baía. Deve levar cerca de um mês a construir; não há pressas. Que diabo, só ontem à noite é que passaram aquelas sequências de Detroit [destruída]. ― Lindblom parecia descontraído. O que, de resto, a sua situação de habilidoso maquetista lhe permitia amplamente. Os homens das ideias eram muito poucos, mas os construtores maquetistas… eram de fato uma seita muito fechada, que nem sequer Brose com todos os seus agentes conseguia penetrar. Eram como os antigos construtores dos vitrais na França do século XIII: que desaparecerem, e com eles o segredo de sua arte.

Do you know how many undercover agents we executed after liberation

American Airlines Reservations +1*855*653*5006 Phone Number American Airlines Reservations Phone Number +1*855*653*5006 is the significant American Airlines that interfaces the United States with awesome objections all through the world. With its successful administrations, most extreme security measures, staggering straightforwardness, and outstanding accommodation, this carrier has become one of the requesting aircrafts from one side of the planet to the other. It is right now planning trips to in excess of 325 objections on six unique landmasses. American works in excess of 5400 trips in a day and hence serving endless travelers around the world. How to Make American Airlines Reservations Online? Those days are the matter of past travelers used to stand in the long queues or pay the heavy price to the travel agent to make their flight bookings as now is the time when this can be simply done on the swipe of the fingertips. American Airlines +1*855*653*5006 offers multiple ways of booking the air tickets – booking through the official website, through the mobile app, by calling the airline’s authority directly. Let’s get to know the procedure to make flight booking with American Airlines official site here. Booking via airlines official website This is the most convenient way to make airline flight booking without any hassle. Use the step-by-step guidance to avoid any further hiccups. American Airlines Booking To begin the procedure, browse the official website of the Delta Airlines and tap on the Book section. Enter the source airport and the destination airport according to your choice. However, if you are confused about the same, browse the list of destinations available on the official website to make a choice. In this step of American Airlines Reservations, you will have to select the trip type from the drop-down menu. There are three options available to choose from – Round Trip, One-Way, and Multi-City. Pick the travel dates as per your trip schedule and move to the next step. Enter the total number of passengers that would be included in the journey. If you wish to make bookings by using miles, tick the checkbox that says – ‘Shop with miles’; however, if you want to pay through cash or credit/ debit card, then drop this checkbox. Also, if you are searching for the Refundable Fares, tick the checkbox accordingly. Hit the Search button and look out for the available flight options according to your entered input. Pick the option that is suitable for your trip as well as fits your budget well. Pay for your flight and confirm American Airlines Flights Booking.

Later, she confessed that ego and prestige played a part; that she loved to possess, to amass. “It is not love of art,” she admitted, in part facetiously. “It is voracity. I am a glutton.” Her agents continued to buy everything available of beauty and value. During her reign, Catherine’s collection expanded to almost four thousand paintings. She became the greatest collector and patron of art in the history of Europe.

American Airlines Reservations Phone Number +1-855-653-5007 American Airlines Reservations Phone Number explorers can receive the rewards of the day in and day out brief client assistance by approaching a devoted American Airlines contact number. At any cases, when the travelers need dire support, they can look for counsel from any AA agents by dialing American Airlines book flight telephone number. After approaching the devoted American Airlines reservations telephone number, you will be associated with one of the client support specialists and your anxiety or question will be tended to inside no time. Moreover, the travelers can likewise benefit numerous other selective administrations assuming they pick this prominent Airline to ship themselves to their ideal objections. The individuals who are beginner and need master help to book a flight; they would have the option to finish their flight booking at very ostensible assistance expense. Restrictive American Airline reservations telephone number is accessible for nonstop reserving help.

He was not a secret DAS agent or a senator snorting paramilitary money or a good machito grinding corn for arepas on Sundays for his family. Homeboy was there and then he wasn’t. Nevertheless, Myriam del Socorro Juan, a.k.a La Mami Mayor, took it to heart to tattoo the pain all over her face as a reminder that my dad was an asshole.

They were all afraid of him, which he liked rather a lot. They didn’t know exactly what he was, only that he was implacable and cruel. His kind was new to the galaxy, a fresh weapon for the dark side to wield. His agents must follow his every order as though the Emperor himself had given it. That sort of power made him feel very strong.

Baptism isn’t primarily a way for us to show our faith and devotion. As with worship more generally, God is the agent here.

The actor and agent here is the Lord, the church’s Bridegroom, and their lives as husband and wife (and as mother- and father-to-be) are here being taken up into that life.

You see, Willhem, he admits that he doesn't know the Law and yet he claims he's innocent." "You're right there, but he can't seem to understand anything," said the other. K. said nothing more; why should I let the idle talk of these lowly agents - they admit themselves that's what they are - confuse me further? he thought. After all, they're discussing things they don't understand. Their confidence is based solely on ignorance.

After analyzing hundreds of letters from the Roman world, many dozens of which mention letter carriers, Head concluded that these couriers played a crucial role in “extending the communication initiated by the letter.”29 As an agent of the sender, the letter carrier acted as a kind of proxy, operating on behalf of the sender. On occasion the named letter carrier did function in some way or another to “represent” the sender, to expand on details with the letter, and even to expound and reinforce the primary message of the letter in oral communication.

We’re at a time of decision, and we don’t know what the decision represents or what choices we have, or even where they lead. Our world is gone, our old world. We can turn and go with it, die with it. The crab can stay in his worn-out shell and perish. We’ve been fortunate, the three of us. We’ve been pushed out to the lip of the shell. We can stand and look around us. The others have already left, gone with the old. Soon we can follow them. Or we can find something else.” “And if we don’t?” “Well, if we don’t we simply die with the rest. Our being picked out this way, the three of us, gives us a chance to escape. We become free agents for a moment. The cosmic process hangs poised. We can start it spinning in any direction we want. Like the figure in the Greek play. He looks around him. What is he going to do?

Despite the fact that three-fourths of Italy’s economic sector was owned by the government by the mid-1930s, most scholars routinely ignored Italian Fascism’s slide into pure Soviet-style socialism, a concentration of state ownership so large that it was only eclipsed by Stalin’s Soviet Union. The conventional definition of socialism is described as a social and economic system characterized by ‘public ownership’ of the ‘means of production.’ On the other hand, fascism is often explained as a social and economic system characterized by ‘public control’ over the ‘agents of production.’ But Mussolini’s regime eventually morphed into Fascist socialism as its means of production was placed under public ownership.

I glanced at the card: Agent Anthony B. Soussan. No wonder he had an attitude; probably got worse every time he had to put last name first. ‘Capito, Agent Soussan, B. Anthony.’ It was a cheap shot, but it was all I could afford.

A great painting should be more than a sum of technical beauty. At the Barnes, we were taught to look for delicacy, subtlety, power, surprise, grace, firmness, complexity, and drama—but to do so with a scientist’s eye. This was an important point. As an art crime investigator, or an undercover agent posing as a collector, I would have to evaluate and expound upon a wide variety of art, regardless of whether I liked a particular piece.

Do you hear that? The ticking of the time clock. It started the very moment President Trump reluctantly ordered the FBI investigation (limited though it may be) into the 'Honorable' Brett Michael Kavanaugh.

That bad, huh?” I said. “That bad,” K-pop repeated. “Like, end-of-the-word-bad?

Michael Jordan: cut from his high school basketball team. Steven Spielberg: rejected from film school three times. Walt Disney: fired by the editor of a newspaper for lacking ideas and imagination. Albert Einstein: He learned to speak at a late age and performed poorly in school. John Grisham: first novel was rejected by sixteen agents and twelve publishing houses. J.K. Rowling: was a divorced, single mother on welfare while writing Harry Potter. Stephen King: his first book “Carrie” was rejected 30 times. He threw it in the trash. His wife retrieved it from the trash and encouraged him to try again. Oprah Winfrey: fired from her television reporting job as “not suitable for television.” The Beatles: told by a record company that they have “no future in show business”.

Though the motif of spiritual warfare is rarely given its full due, the biblical narrative could in fact be accurately described as a story of God’s ongoing conflict with and ultimate victory over cosmic and human agents who oppose him and who threaten his creation.

If your status quo is driving people, your efforts to build trust will be undermined. Trust and driving people cannot coexist. If trust is the end you desire, then driving change must be the means.

When someone is driving people, they are assuming they cannot trust their colleagues to accept a change without force or rewards.

When you drive people, they shrink. They hide. It dulls their ability to choose, think, or act. They cower. They wait.

Through his embedded experience in the Montgomery bus boycotts, Reverend King came to see the limits of Niebuhr’s abstract public theologizing. “Abstractions cannot empower acts of compassion and sacrifice,” Marsh summarizes, “or sustain the courage to speak against the day. Niebuhr’s much-heralded Christian realism was about working out ethical problems within the framework of options provided by Western liberalism. It was not about having a dream.”18 That dream was the kingdom of God, and King learned it at church. But it wasn’t just for the church: it was a vision of what the world was called to be. For King, the realization of this was not some merely evolutionary development but rather a divine gift. “God remains from beginning to end the ultimate agent of human liberation, not only in America but throughout all the nations and in creation.

Everyone wants to see themselves as the hero of their own story. When he's (Agent 216) with the State, he makes perfectly good arguments because he feels he's doing right, despite the atrocities he's committing on behalf of the State. He's definitely a villain at the start, somebody you really love to hate. Then, as things transition, it humanizes him to the point where you're really rooting for him.

A puzzle that remains in the field of allostery in this high-throughput era is that we have had very limited tools that allow us to answer the general question of which proteins in the proteome are allosteric and who their binding partners are. Despite Monod's characterization of the allostery phenomenon as the second secret of life, because of this important knowledge gap, as a field we are often flying blind because of our ignorance of how the key molecular players in the signaling pathways have their activity modified by other chemical agents, and because of our ignorance of the identity of those chemical agents themselves. To that end, the emergence of mass spectrometry has provided an exciting opportunity to query not only the posttranslational modifications suffered by a given signaling molecule but also, because of recent innovations, when signaling molecules have bound a given small molecule. We see that by lysing cells in the absence and in the presence of some small-molecule allosteric effector candidate, some proteins will bind that small molecule and, as a result, be resistant to limited proteolysis by proteinase K. This means that when the proteins are denatured and trypsin digested, the pattern of cuts in the polypeptide chain will be different for any protein that was bound to the candidate small molecule. Approaches such as this hold the promise of systematic identification of the allosterome for any organism and will be a critical part of our resolution of the puzzles of how the macromolecules of the cell are controlled by a battery of small molecules.

A certain magistrate told somebody whom he was examining in court that he or she "should always be polite to the police." I do not know whether the magistrate noticed the circumstance, but the word "polite" and the word "police" have the same origin and meaning. Politeness means the atmosphere and ritual of the city, the symbol of human civilisation. The policeman means the representative and guardian of the city, the symbol of human civilisation. Yet it may be doubted whether the two ideas are commonly connected in the mind. It is probable that we often hear of politeness without thinking of a policeman; it is even possible that our eyes often alight upon a policeman without our thoughts instantly flying to the subject of politeness. Yet the idea of the sacred city is not only the link of them both, it is the only serious justification and the only serious corrective of them both. If politeness means too often a mere frippery, it is because it has not enough to do with serious patriotism and public dignity; if policemen are coarse or casual, it is because they are not sufficiently convinced that they are the servants of the beautiful city and the agents of sweetness and light. Politeness is not really a frippery. Politeness is not really even a thing merely suave and deprecating. Politeness is an armed guard, stern and splendid and vigilant, watching over all the ways of men; in other words, politeness is a policeman. A policeman is not merely a heavy man with a truncheon: a policeman is a machine for the smoothing and sweetening of the accidents of everyday existence. In other words, a policeman is politeness; a veiled image of politeness—sometimes impenetrably veiled. But my point is here that by losing the original idea of the city, which is the force and youth of both the words, both the things actually degenerate. Our politeness loses all manliness because we forget that politeness is only the Greek for patriotism. Our policemen lose all delicacy because we forget that a policeman is only the Greek for something civilised. A policeman should often have the functions of a knight-errant. A policeman should always have the elegance of a knight-errant.

When they are in power, whether in statehouses, Congress, or the White House, Republicans are magnetically drawn to practice political overreach along with scorched-earth tactics, be it through vote suppression, the K Street Project to force lobbying firms to hire only Republicans, or outing a covert CIA agent in their own administration to settle political scores, as happened to Valerie Plame. When they are out of power they focus single-mindedly on seizing up the wheels of government to prove to the American people that government just doesn’t work—at least, when the GOP is out of power. These take-no-prisoners tactics flow naturally from an embittered, Manichaean mind-set. This mentality has grave implications for the health of our constitutional system.

This vital piece of intelligence proved that the K-129 sank far closer to Hawaii than the government was ever to reveal. The oil slick sample returned by the Teritu proved that the source of the radiation could only have been from a smashed Soviet ballistic missile warhead. Thus, the boat’s logs had to be suppressed, and its crew sworn to secrecy. More than thirty years after the incident, spokespersons for the University of Hawaii claim they have no idea what happened to the ship’s deck logs. The Teritu’s crew and scientists who were aboard at the time refused to be interviewed about their discovery. The crew members of the research ship were compelled by federal agents to sign confidentiality agreements, never to discuss the voyage that discovered the radiated oil slick off the Hawaiian Islands.

What finally grabbed the attention of the Soviet intelligence agents about the Swordfish report was the timing: The American submarine had entered port only a few days after K-129 went missing. Soviet naval intelligence quickly seized on this tidbit to make the erroneous assumption that the Americans were complicit in the loss of their submarine. This fallacious interpretation of human intelligence became one of the enduring myths of the K-129 incident and may have led to a horrific act by the Soviet navy—the revenge sinking of an American submarine two months later, in another part of the world.